Back Next Week

Hey all you PIFfies, one of the CJD household's pets started this week off in the hospital. She's home and doing much better now but combine that with the fact that I'm wrapping up a month of 3rd shift and this week became a lost cause for the blog. We'll be back Tuesday with a wild ass 4 way and get right back into the swing of things. Have a good weekend and give your furry ones an extra pet for me!

Forever Forward Fridays

LuFisto VS Kimber Lee - Women Wrestling Revolution 4/10/2016

CJD: I've watched a lot of LuFisto matches for PIF at this point. But I've yet to see a bad one. The dynamic here is so different than last week's as Kimber Lee clearly has LuFisto's respect but still has so much to earn. I loved how big they made this match feel, how hard Kimber Lee had to work for what she got, how they took a generic crowd brawl and made it organic and awesome, and how they brought things home. LuFisto just carries herself like everything matters, she projects such a big presence. And Lee was right there with her standing her ground and then some.

JJZ: So before we started Play It Forward I didn't even know who LuFisto was. Now I think I can confidently say she is a top 20 all time women's wrestler. She has such spectacular fundamentals. She does the little things so well. And getting to see her work with such a baby faced Kimber Lee was such a treat. I'm a big fan of the Princess also and I'm pretty sure this is the earliest match I've seen of her. The dynamic between the two played out great and they both didn't hold back at all. Kimber proving herself to the old Lioness. The vet showing the younger wrestler how it's done. Just good shit. Loved the finish, totally believable.

Suzuki Goon

Zack Sabre Jr VS Trent Seven - Kamikaze Pro 2/2/2018

JJZ: I really like Trent Seven. Especially his selling. Zack Sabre Jr is easy but also hard to play forward. Easy because he has wrestled every one ever but hard because he is so damn good that I don't want it to seem like I'm just sharing the first thing I watched. So this was the second match I watched! The first was a Tyler Bate match, and while it was good it wasn't great and maybe over-stayed its welcome. Then I went over to Trent. This match had some really special things in it. First Trent's selling. Tremendous. I was really marking out on the selling of his own offense. A lot of the time he made it feel like he was just throwing shit out last minute hoping it lands. And Fucking Zack. I swear he really just makes shit up as he goes. I was falling for the falsies and loved the home stretch. Enjoy my boy.

CJD: One thing I love is watching great wrestlers wrestle in front of different types of audiences and seeing how they adjust. This match accomplished that big time compared to what I'm used to from these guys. It was super cheeky at times, a little touch and go at other times, and then it landed exactly where it needed to. I agree completety that it felt like they called a good amount on the fly which I loved. The announcers cracked me up by how knowledgable they tried to sound on the submissions. "He's got a Crippler Crossface combined with a Michinoku Driver combined with a La Magistral!!!" This was a really good match that didn't take itself too seriosly but still delivered big time for the crowd it was in front of. Nice find baby, and I'm glad you didn't go with the first match you stumbled across.

Forever Forward Fridays

LuFisto VS Jordynne Grace - Beyond Wrestling 5/29/2016

JJZ: So I think this is the first time we are playing a match forward of a tag team working each other. This was an old lion vs young lion style match. LuFisto really controlled this one for most of it. Grace's selling was way better than I've seen from her before but to be honest this might be the first time I've seen her working from under this much. Really solid psychology trying to work on Grace's core. Some innovative transitions and some really stiff strikes. I popped a few times with LuFisto's aggressiveness. I feel like this was a giving Jordynne the business kinda match. Making her earn her stripes so to speak. The home stretch was was a lot of fun and the finish caught me off guard.

CJD: I expected this match to be good. I didn't expect it to be great. But I'd say it pretty comfortably was by the end. I also think this is the first significant partner VS partner match we've featured which is interesting because which one of these ladies is technically our imaginary FFFriday Champion right now?? Is the belt held up?? Anyway, they weren't teaming yet at this point I don't think but knowing Grace so clearly earned LuFisto's respect in matches like this one makes me appreciate their team that much more. I loved how engaged in the moment both ladies were, how much they were feeding off each other. The grimey hold for hold stuff combined with the chippy shots gave this the feel of early 2000s IWAMS or something generally from a different era. That's an aspect of LuFisto's style that I really enjoy. Her being such a student of the game and paving the way for the likes of Jordynne gave the young lion aspect of this that much more gravity.

Supernova Goes Pop

Yoshinari Ogawa/Zack Sabre Jr VS Muhammad Yone/Katsuhiko Nakajima - NOAH 2/22/2015

CJD: This match brought a smile to my face because it brought me back to PIF's roots almost 4 years ago. After developing this idea for a long time we kicked things off with a series of matches that I still think define our mission statement here, one of which was a ZSJ/Ogawa tag. So why not revisit this underrated tandem?? And how about a workman's team if I ever saw one in 2015 mohawk Yone and "finding himself" puffy pants Nakajima?? This match had me guessing after talking about booking with a real sense of hierarchy, because everyone here has a clear place on their team, and all these guys were typically booked with purpose. Still this match feels a little thrown together, like something to round out an undercard, yet it still builds to a really nice finish. You get the sense these teams could run a rematch for the tag titles in a high profile match and knock it out of the park. For what this was I would have loved 5 more minutes but what we got still left me very satisfied and felt very on-brand for PIF.

JJZ: I would put Zack Sabre Jr and Ogawa as one of my favorite tag teams over the past ten years. Their feuds with Tiger Mask IV/Jushin Liger and Kotage/Harada are low key some of the best junior tag matches in recent memory. This match is wonderful Chris. Just good solid wrestling. Yone is great for this match. He doesn't bring it down at all. Just adds baby. Chubby Nakajima was so much fun. This was before he fully joined NOAH and they still used him in odd spots. I don't know if you remember but I showed you a singles match between Zack and Naks right around this timeframe. Anyway. Good shit baby cakes. It was such a fun watch, I just enjoyed what was on the screen for 17 minutes.

Forever Forward Fridays

Team PAWG VS Chuck Taylor/Orange Cassidy - Beyond 9/24/2017

CJD: I've been thinking about what a great career LuFisto has had despite the odds, so happy for her Indie HoF induction. So this match caught me at the right time, plus OC ties perfectly into last week's match even without Chuck Taylor as his partner! I gotta say Freshly Hungover Orange Cassidy isn't my favorite version of his schtick but he really grinds this one out if he is indeed hurting as bad as Bryce implies. This match was the type of goofy fun you'd expect and by the end it had me grinning big time on my lunch break. Gotta love Beyond bringing the goods with the YouTube uploads as always. This is familiar FFFriday grounds but that doesn't make it any less enjoyable.

JJZ: I love this venue! This was such a fun match. Chuck and Orange are the perfect dance partners for an intergender tag match. I thought everyone looked very polished and experienced. Besides LuFisto everyone is pretty young still. I think this is such a good match before the main event. I wish Orange still did a few of the things he did in this match. Like the hand fake outs and the sunglasses flip. I got a real kick out of the finish. Gotta stay strong brother!

CJD: Yeah man, if I was going on in the main event after this I would thank every one of these four individuals. Give em a good ol worker's handshake. This must have set the table beautifully.